Snowden says Google, Facebook, Apple gave direct acces to NSA

Zee Media Bureau Washington: Freshly released interview excerpts of former intelligence contractor Edward Snowden reveal that major US tech companies like Google, Facebook and Apple “get together” with the National Security Agency to provide them the information and data sent and shared by the people. The latest revelations come as The Guardian has published the second part of an interview given by Snowden on June 6, 2013. US whistleblower Snowden claims that the US surveillance program PRISM that facilitates the government to access enormous data that people communicate, even the “birthday wishes”, was a good example of the co-operation between the government and the US corporate world. “We`ve got PRISM, which is a demonstration how the US government co-ops US corporate power to its own ends,” says Snowden. Blaming the major American web companies for the co-operating in snooping, Snowden says, “Companies like Google, Facebook, Apple, Microsoft — they all get together with the NSA and provide the NSA with direct access to the backends to all of the systems you use to communicate, to store your data, to put things in the cloud, and even just to send birthday wishes and keep a record of your life.” Earlier, the companies like Google, Facebook, Apple and Microsoft have vehemently denied being aware of the government’s surveillance programme PRISM. The tech companies have refuted the claims that they allowed the US government to tap directly from their servers. Speaking against the web companies’ denial, Snowden claims, “And they give the NSA direct access so that they don`t need to oversee so they can`t be held liable for it. I think that`s a dangerous capability for anybody to have, but particularly an organization that`s demonstrated time and time against that they`ll work to shield themselves from oversight.”

Snowden is currently in the transit zone of a Moscow airport and has received three asylum offers from Latin American nations Venezuela, Nicaragua and Bolivia.